Sprinting up 86 flights of stairs of the Empire State Building -- even if it's for a worthy cause -- is not everyone's idea of a good time. Especially when there's an elevator nearby. But tonight, more than 650 participants will take the long way up one of New York's most iconic landmarks at this year's Empire State Building Run-Up.

Study finds that, when offered, many restaurant patrons choose to consume less food and fewer calories.

Move over, coffee and Red Bull. A Harvard professor thinks the next big thing will be people inhaling their caffeine from a lipstick-sized tube. Critics say the novel product is not without its risks.

The company that made its name peddling drugstore paternity tests to uncertain parents now says that more than 1 in 10 adults in the U.S. has had reason to ask the question: Who’s your Daddy? Gary Garner finally confirmed he's the real father of Skyler, 14.

Illinois is basking in its sixth warmest winter in 117 years -- good news for residents who have not had to shovel snow but a red flag for some of the state's most productive businesses: farms.

At least four Balkan nations suspended shipping on the Danube River because of severe frost and the vast amount of ice blocking the heavily traveled waterway.

Organizers of the near-mythical Eleven Cities Tour dealt 16,000 skaters and the nation at large a crushing blow Wednesday when they decided the ice was too thin to hold the 125-mile (200-kilometer) skating marathon for the first time in 15 years.

Hard as it may be to believe if you live in the Northeast or upper Midwest, last January was not the warmest on record across the lower 48 states, federal recordkeepers announced Tuesday.

Much of Europe is still covered in snow and ice, but some areas are already seeing deadly flooding amid concerns that it will get worse before it gets better.

In a vineyard in Moravia, the Arctic chill striking Europe at least has some people jumping with joy.

A new unpublished history of the Afghanistan war details hows American forces, hamstrung by inadequate resources, missed opportunities to stabilize Afghanistan during the early years of the conflict.

Thirty-seven years later, three people face trial on murder charges for what prosecutors say was an ambush triggered by a love triangle around a woman and three Marine buddies.

A U.S. base on Okinawa is the focus of a deepening dispute that is testing Japan's security alliance with the United States and dividing its new government in Tokyo.

A survivor of the suicide bombing on the USS Cole in Yemen 10 years ago has died at his Florida home.

The family of a U.S. soldier captured in eastern Afghanistan pleads for his release after the Taliban releases a video showing the airborne infantryman, who has been held more than five months.

The impact of a controversial new Texas law that requires women to have a sonogram — and listen to a description of the fetus as well as its heartbeat — is far from clear.

Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies rush to dispel rumors that Latino families would be deported if they give information about child sexual abuse allegations at an elementary school.

A Mississippi inmate has been put to death for killing two men in a December 1995 robbery spree after courts declined to stop the execution based on arguments that he was mentally ill.

By Kara Reinhardt, Cheapism.com Could an old mattress be responsible for a lackluster love life? A recent survey found that almost a quarter of respondents with a mattress more than 10 years old report less romance in their lives — and most blame the mattress.

There are plenty of bargain-priced cars, trucks and crossovers, but that doesn’t always mean they add up to a good deal.

Honda is bracing for a possible flood of lawsuits if it loses an appeal of a recent small claims court decision that ruled the Civic Hybrid's mileage didn't live up to promises.

Online dating sites advertise groundbreaking technology and sophisticated formulas and state-of-the-art programming to help you find your true soul mate.  But does it work?

Lovebirds spend an average of $100 on gifts for their Valentine. Here's a way to make sure your sweetie gets some tasty sweets without breaking the bank.

Jimmy Fallon perhaps unwisely took on Michelle Obama at the White House in several exercise competitions, while Jimmy Kimmel pointed out Mitt Romney's loose approach to facts.

Is your toilet paper wiping out forests used by tigers, elephants, orangutans and other wildlife? The World Wildlife Fund alleged that a major paper supplier is clearcutting in Indonesia.

Bulgaria and Romania are suspending all shipping on the Danube River due to the vast amount of ice blocking the waterway amid Europe's widespread big freeze.

Greece's economic crisis is taking its toll on people - hospital admissions are up 25%, suicides are up 40% and violent crimes, including murder, are up almost 100%. NBC's Keith Miller reports from Athens.

Supporters of the Maldives' former president rioted Wednesday as the country's new leader appealed for an end to the political turmoil in this Indian Ocean nation.

After more than two decades of drilling in Antarctica, Russian scientists have reached the surface of a gigantic freshwater lake hidden under miles of ice for some 20 million years — a lake that may hold life from the distant past and clues to the search for life on other planets.

Is your toilet paper wiping out forests used by tigers, elephants, orangutans and other wildlife? The World Wildlife Fund alleged that a major paper supplier is clearcutting in Indonesia.

California's Gold Rush was more than a century-and-a-half ago, but its Wild West spirit lives on in a dispute between government agencies and a landowner in the Sierra Nevada foothills.

The melt-off from the world's ice sheets, ice caps and glaciers over eight years of the past decade would have been enough to cover the United States in about 18 inches (46 centimeters) of water, according to new research based on the most-comprehensive analysis of satellite data yet.

Hard as it may be to believe if you live in the Northeast or upper Midwest, last January was not the warmest on record across the lower 48 states, federal recordkeepers announced Tuesday.

Quiet oceans make for calmer right whales, new research suggests. When fewer ships sail the Bay of Fundy, the big baleen whales are less stressed — as evidenced by hormone levels in their poop.

Pakistanis reel in one of the biggest fish in the sea: a whale shark.

Nepal has opened vulture "restaurants" to save the birds from extinction — and at the same time help impoverished villages become self-sufficient.

Nearly 130 dolphins have beached themselves on Cape Cod in the last three weeks, with 92 dying in what's become "the single largest stranding" in at least two decades in the Northeast.

Freshman Austin Rivers buried a 3-pointer at the horn to give No. 10 Duke an 85-84 win over No. 5 North Carolina on Wednesday night.

Arc: After a blowout loss to Kansas, Baylor is 0-3 against Top 10 teams, which makes it difficult to say with confidence that the Bears have the firepower to make it to the Final Four in New Orleans.

Dwight Howard had 25 points and 24 rebounds, Ryan Anderson scored 27 points and the Orlando Magic hit 17 3-pointers in a 102-89 victory over the Miami Heat on Wednesday night.

What a week it has been for Jeremy Lin.

Derrick Rose gutted it out and started against the struggling New Orleans Hornets only two days after leaving Chicago's previous game with back spasms.

Back on home ice — where they have been unbeatable for three months — the Detroit Red Wings closed in on an NHL record.